DThe Union of Values around the former President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Hans-Georg Maaßen, has founded a party and wants to recruit voters to the right of the Union. Maaßen was unanimously elected chairman; the party also adopted an initial program. Maaßen and his supporters met on Saturday on an excursion boat on the Rhine near Remagen to found the company.
Maaßen said that they had gathered near Bonn because the Union of Values wanted to build on the Bonn Republic. “We just want to go back to the future. The future can only be based on values if we once again use the values that made the old Federal Republic strong, that made the old CDU strong, as a means, as ways to overcome the problems of today and, above all, tomorrow,” said Maaßen .
In an interview with the broadcaster tv.berlin broadcast on Friday evening, Maaßen said that the Union of Values wanted to fill the gap between the classic CDU/CSU, which had left the path, and the AfD, which had become radical. The union of values is for freedom, the rule of law, democracy, tolerance, but also for the state to withdraw from life. “We would like to address the critical bourgeoisie, from the conservatives to the market and national liberals, the libertarians (…) to the classic social democrats, who represented a social democracy like Helmut Schmidt.”
Union of Values is not running in the European elections
The conservative Values Union association, which has long been close to the CDU, set the course for the founding of the party in January at a general meeting in Erfurt by transferring the naming rights. The Maaßen Party is the second prominent new formation in 2024. First, the Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) alliance of the former left-wing politician was formed as a party. According to Maaßen, the Union of Values should compete in the state elections in September in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia, but not in the European elections in June.
The former chairman of the Values Union association, Alexander Mitsch, the former Vice Admiral Kay-Achim Schönbach, and the former CDU member of the Bundestag Albert Weiler were elected as deputy chairmen of the Values Union.
The CDU executive board initiated exclusion proceedings against Maaßen last year; In January, Maaßen himself left the CDU. Maaßen was President of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) from 2012 to 2018.
The then Federal Minister of the Interior Horst Seehofer (CSU) sent him into temporary retirement in November 2018. The reasons for this decision included Maaßen's statements about riots in Chemnitz as well as a speech manuscript by the then head of the authority, which spoke of “left-wing radical forces in the SPD” with a view to the former coalition partner. A few days ago it became known that the Office for the Protection of the Constitution was keeping an eye on Maaßen. As can be seen from a letter that Maaßen himself published, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution stored data on Maaßen in the authority's information system in the area of right-wing extremism.
The draft for the founding program of the Union of Values contains some statements that are also found in a similar form in the basic program of the AfD; It was initially unclear which passages were changed at the founding meeting. The agreed program should be published in the evening. “We are in favor of dismantling the party state and expanding the rule of the people, including through the introduction of plebiscitary elements such as the referendum,” said the draft of the Union of Values. The AfD writes: “We want to give the people the right to vote on laws passed by parliament.” According to the draft, the Union of Values wants children “to be protected from early sexualization and gender ideology, especially in daycare centers and schools.” The AfD demands “not to allow early sexualization in crèches, kindergartens and schools and to stop making children feel insecure about their sexual identity.”
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